Profile-Driven Response to Communication Events

ABSTRACT

A method includes storing a setting in a profile of a wireless device to cause an automatic message response to incoming calls. When the profile is set as the active profile and an incoming call is received, an automatic response is provided to the incoming call in accordance with the setting.

FIELD

The invention relates to communications, and, more particularly, toautomatic response to communication events.

BACKGROUND

Wireless telephones are popular, ubiquitous devices. It is now possibleto make and receive phone calls from almost any place in the world.Communication is even possible from remote and undeveloped areas usingwireless satellite telephones. Herein, the term wireless telephonerefers to any device capable of transmitting and receiving voice and/ordata (non-voice) information to and from a network without the use ofwires, cables, or other tangible transmission media. So called cellulartelephones are a common example of wireless phones.

Wireless telephones and the networks by which they communicate includeanalog mobile phone service (AMPS), and so-called second generation (2G)and third-generation (3G) devices that operate according to variouscommunication technologies, including circuit switching, packetswitching, wireless local area network (LAN) protocols, code divisionmultiple access (CDMA), time division multiple access (TDMA),frequency-division multiplexing (FDM), spread-spectrum, global systemfor mobile communications (GSM), high-speed circuit-switched data(HCSD), general packet radio system (GPRS), enhanced data GSMenvironment (EDGE), and universal mobile telecommunications service(UMTS). Of course, these are only examples, and other technologies maybe employed in wireless communication as well.

Herein, the term ‘wireless device’ is meant to include wirelesstelephones (including cellular, mobile, and satellite telephones), andalso to include a variety of other wireless devices, including wirelessweb-access telephones, automobile, laptop, and desktop computers thatcommunicate wirelessly, and wireless personal digital assistants (PDAs).In general, the term ‘wireless device’ refers to any device withwireless communication capabilities.

Many companies produce wireless telephones and other wireless devices.Among the more well-known producers are Nokia®, Ericsson®, Motorola®,Panasonic®, Palm® Computer, and Handspring®. A variety of producers alsoprovide wireless devices comprising versions of the Microsoft® Windows®operating software.

Along with the ubiquity of wireless telephones come drawbacks. Onedrawback is that public and private places are now prone to interruptionby incoming calls to wireless phones. In certain places, such as movietheatres and meeting rooms, such interruptions may be unwelcome.

One solution to this problem is described in U.S. patent applicationSer. No. ______, entitled System and Method for Providing an AutomaticResponse to a Telephone Call. A voice or text response is sent to thecaller without requiring the user of the telephone to answer the call.The user may perform an action (such as pressing a button on thetelephone) to initiate response, or the telephone and/or network mayautomatically (without user intervention) initiate response.

Modern wireless telephones may be configured with profiles to controlthe behavior of the telephone in different situations. As used herein,the term “profile” refers to data, stored in an electronic memory of thetelephone, telephone peripheral device, or the network, which may beaccessed to determine the behavior of a wireless telephone. One or moreprofiles may be available for the phone, such as Normal, Silent, andMeeting. The ‘active’ profile is the profile selected from among theavailable profiles to control the phone's behavior. For example, aMeeting profile may include settings to control the manner in which atelephone behaves upon receiving an incoming call (vibrate or ring, ringtone, number of rings before going to voice mail, etc.). When the“Meeting” profile is selected, the phone may vibrate instead of ringingupon receiving an incoming call, and may go to voice mail after a singlering.

Profiles are convenient, effective, and well understood by the users ofwireless telephones. The response of wireless phones to incoming callsor other communication events could thus benefit from the expanded useof profiles.

SUMMARY

In one embodiment, a profile of a wireless device includes a setting tocause an automatic message response to incoming calls. When the profileis set as the active profile and an incoming call is received, anautomatic response is provided to the incoming call in accordance withthe setting.

In another embodiment, a wireless device is used to select an activeprofile. In response to selection of the active profile, signalingoccurs between the wireless device and a network by which the wirelessdevice communicates. The network is configured according to at least onesetting of the active profile to automatically provide a responsemessage to callers of the wireless device.

In another embodiment, a wireless communication network includesfunctionality to provide at least one of SMS, EMS, and MMS messages. Thenetwork includes at least one setting for a wireless device thatcommunicates by way of the network. The setting causes the network toautomatically respond to callers of the wireless device with a responsemessage. The network includes logic to alter the setting in accordancewith changes to an active profile of the wireless device.

FIGURES

The invention may be better understood with reference to the followingfigures in light of the accompanying description. The present invention,however, is limited only by the scope of the claims at the concludingportion of the specification.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an embodiment of a profile.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an embodiment of a method ofconfiguring the response of a wireless device to incoming calls.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a network embodiment including acts of amethod embodiment to reconfigure network settings.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of a network embodiment including acts of amethod embodiment to respond to an incoming call.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram of a network embodiment including acts of amethod embodiment to respond to an incoming call.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of an embodiment of a wireless telephone.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart of an embodiment of a method to automaticallyrespond to incoming calls.

FIG. 8 is a flow chart of an embodiment of a method to automaticallyrespond to incoming calls.

DESCRIPTION

In the following description, numerous references to “one embodiment” or“an embodiment” do not necessarily refer to the same embodiment,although they may. In the figures, like numbers refer to like elements.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a profile 102.The profile 102 may be stored in the memory of a wireless device, and/orin a memory of the network by which the wireless device communicates.The profile includes settings to control the manner in which the deviceresponds to incoming calls. A setting is any information relating to thedevice. For example, settings may include ring options 104 such assilent, ring once, and beep once. Settings may also include the ringtone 106, such as ring-ring, low, ‘mosquito’, ‘bee’, ‘city bird’, andother popular tones or tunes. Settings may also include the ring volume108, whether the device should vibrate or not 110 and the tone 112 touse to alert to the presence of new messages. Of course, additionaland/or different settings are possible in other embodiments.

The profile may further comprise settings to determine the responsebehavior to incoming calls. One setting 114 may determine whether toautomatically respond to incoming calls with a message. Another setting116 may determine a particular message to respond with. Yet anothersetting 117 may determine the technique for communicating the responsemessage.

The profile may comprise a setting 118 to determine whether to respondwith a particular message depending upon the date and/or time of day. Anelectronic calendar may be applied to facilitate this process. Anothersetting 120 may determine whether to respond with a particular messagedepending upon the location of the device. Again, a calendar may beapplied to facilitate this process.

Another setting 122 may determine whether to respond with a particularmessage according to the caller's identity. An address book/contact listmay be applied to facilitate this process.

The profile embodiment 102 of FIG. 1 defines the phone's responsebehavior to incoming calls as follows: ring once at low volume (volumelevel=1) with the ‘bee’ tone, don't vibrate, and automatically respondto the caller with the message “I'm in a meeting right now. Please callback.” The messaging technique is Short Messaging Service (SMS). Themessage is always the same and is not specific to the time, date, orlocation of the phone, nor is the message specific to the caller's id.

SMS, otherwise known as text messaging, mobile messaging, oralphanumeric paging, allows for the communication of short text andnumeric messages to and from wireless devices, as well as to and frompublic SMS messaging gateways on the Internet. A detailed description ofSMS is available as part of the GSM standard.

Another messaging technique that may be specified in the profile isEnhanced Messaging Service (EMS). EMS supports the capabilities of SMSto communicate short text and numeric messages, but also includescapabilities for the communication of other types'of data, includingsound, animation, graphics, and additional text-formatting capabilities.Yet another messaging technique that may be specified in the profile isMultimedia Messaging Service (MMS). MMS provides for the communicationof video and other advanced multimedia formats.

The user of the device may select an active profile from among thephone's profiles, and by doing so may determine the phone's (or thenetwork's) response behavior to incoming calls. Profiles may be named,and in one embodiment the user may select the active profile from amongavailable profiles using the keypad and display. Common names forprofiles include Normal, Silent, Meeting, Outdoor, and Pager.

The response message may be automatically transmitted by the wirelessdevice, or by the network by which the wireless device communicates. Forexample, a wireless phone may automatically respond to incoming callswith the SMS message “I'm in a meeting right now. Please call back.”(refer to the discussion of FIG. 1). Alternatively, the network mayintercept the incoming call to the phone and provide the responsemessage to the caller. Thus, in the preceding example, the SMS messagemay be transmitted to the caller by the network without ever alertingthe phone of the incoming call. Selection of an active profile may thusresult in the reconfiguration of a network setting, thus affecting theresponse message to the caller. As another example, selection of anactive profile may select the voice mail prompt that a caller hears whenthe call goes to voice mail.

The caller's id (for example, their phone number and/or IP address) maybe recorded in a call log or other record, so that the called party isaware of who called and when, and may return the call at a convenienttime.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an embodiment of a method ofconfiguring the response of a wireless device to incoming calls. Theselection of an active profile at 202 results in an exchange of signalsat 204 between the wireless device and the devices of the network overwhich the wireless device communicates. At 206 the voice mail responseto incoming calls to the wireless device is selected according to theactive profile. For example, changing the currently active profile from“Silent” to “Meeting” may result in signaling between the wirelessdevice and the network, such that at 208 the voice mail response thatcallers hear is changed from “I am unavailable. Please call back later”,to “I can't take your call right now because I'm in a meeting.” A callat 210 to the wireless device results in transmission of the voice mailresponse to the caller at 212.

Alterations to the settings of the active profile (henceforth, “profilesettings”) may also result in an exchange of signals between thewireless device and the devices of the network over which the wirelessdevice communicates. Such exchange of signals may affect at least onesetting of the network (henceforth, “network settings”). The network maycomprise logic to affect one or more network settings for the wirelessdevice in accordance with changes to active profile settings of thewireless device. Such logic may comprise any set of instruction signalsand/or data applied to control processes of the network. Network logicmay be embodied in software, hardware, firmware, and/or combinationsthereof.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a network including acts of a method toreconfigure network settings. The network and the acts illustrated aremerely possible embodiments. Base station controllers (BSC) 302, 304include antennae 306, 308 respectively to receive signals from wirelessdevices 312, 310. The BSCs 302, 304 are coupled to a mobile switchingcenter (MSC) 316 network element that is responsible, among otherthings, for routing calls to their appropriate destination. Herein, theterm “network element” refers to any one or more devices of acommunication network. The MSC 316 is coupled to a terrestrial(non-wireless) communication network 314 to enable communication withwired devices such as home and business telephones. The MSC 316comprises Simple Message System (SMS) functionality 318 to route SMSmessages between mobile devices. SMS messages may also be communicatedto and from a personal computer (PC) 328 or other Internet-coupleddevice via an SMS gateway 326 to the Internet 324. In other embodiments,EMS and/or MMS functionality could replace or supplement the SMSfunctionality 318. Not shown for clarity of explanation, but understoodby those skilled in the art, are other components included in a typicalMSC 316, such as a processor, memory, and various input/output devices.

A Home Location Registry (HLR) 320 stores network settings associatedwith the wireless device 310 and that determine the response to incomingcalls to the wireless device 310. If the wireless device 310 is roamingon the network, such network settings may be stored in a VisitorLocation Registry (VLR) 322.

In one embodiment, a new active profile is selected for the wirelessdevice 310 at 350, resulting in a wireless signal to the network at 352.At 354 the BSC 304 converts the wireless signal to a signal to the MSC316. As a result, a reconfiguration of network settings takes place at356 (possibly, as shown, by changing settings in the HLR 320 for thewireless device 310).

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of a network including acts of a method torespond to an incoming call. Again, the network and the acts illustratedare merely possible embodiments. At 360 the first wireless device 312initiates a call to a second wireless device 310. The BSC 302 receivesthe call at 362 and forwards it to the MSC 316. At 364 the MSC 316 readsthe settings for the called party (device 310) from the HLR 320 anddetermines that a message should be automatically returned to the caller312 in response to the call. The messaging technique could be voicemail, SMS, EMS, MMS, or some other technique. At 366 the message isreturned from the HLR 320. At 368 the message is passed to the BSC 302.At 370 the message is communicated wirelessly to the caller 312.

The response message may comprise information to the caller about how toleave a message for the called party. For example, the response messagecould say, “I'm in a meeting at the moment. Please press one to leave avoice mail.”

When the caller is an Internet-coupled device, the response message mayat some point in the communication process be converted to anInternet-compatible format, such as into an email or instant message(IM).

FIG. 5 is a block diagram of a network including acts of a method torespond to an incoming call. Again, the network and the acts illustratedare merely possible embodiments. At 372 the first wireless device 312initiates a call to a second wireless device 310. The BSC 302 receivesthe call at 374 and forwards it to the MSC 316. At 376 the MSC 316routes the call to the appropriate BSC 304 for the second wirelessdevice 310. At 378 the incoming call is transmitted to the secondwireless device 310. The active profile of the device 310 is read at380, and an automatic response message is determined at 382 according tothe active profile. In one embodiment, the response is an SMS message.The response technique could also be EMS, MMS, voice, or othertechnique. At 384-390, the message is communicated to the BSC 304,through the MSC 316, to the BSC 302, and finally to the caller 312.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of an embodiment 600 of a wireless telephone.A wireless communication interface 606 is coupled to a memory 604 and adigital signal processor (DSP) 618. The wireless communication interface606 converts signals of the DSP 618 and/or the memory 604 into wirelesssignals that may be transmitted via the antennae 602. Numerous otherwell-known elements of the telephone embodiment 600 have been omittedfor clarity.

The memory 604 comprises a plurality of profiles 608, including anactive profile 610. The memory 604 further comprises profileconfiguration logic 612 to affect the settings of the profiles 608, andresponse logic 614 to read the settings of the active profile 610 andrespond to incoming calls accordingly. Profile configuration logic 612and response logic 614 may comprise any set of instruction signalsand/or data that may be applied to/processed by the DSP 618 or otherprocessor of the telephone 600. Profile configuration logic 612 andresponse logic 614 may be embodied in software, hardware, firmware,and/or combinations thereof. The response logic 614 may provide forresponse by way of one of SMS, EMS, and MMS.

A display 616 may be employed to display the settings of the profiles608 so that a user of the telephone 600 may read or change the settingsof the profiles 608. An input device 622 such as a keypad, buttons,touchpad, or voice recognition interface allows the user to input and/orselect profile settings and select an active profile. In one embodiment,the input device 622 may be integral with the display 616 (e.g. touch orpressure-sensitive screen).

FIG. 7 is a flow chart of an embodiment of a method to automaticallyrespond to incoming calls. At 702 an incoming call event occurs. At 704it is determined whether the active profile indicates an automaticresponse to incoming calls. If not, the method concludes at 706.Otherwise, a check is made at 708 as to whether the active profileindicates a particular response message for this caller. If so, themessage for the particular caller is transmitted to the caller at 710.If not, a general message is transmitted to the caller at 712. Invarious embodiments, the messaging technique is SMS, EMS, MMS, and/orvoice.

An electronic contact list and/or address book may be employed tofacilitate response with a caller-specific message. For example, in oneembodiment the caller's id (for example their telephone number and/or IPaddress) may be applied to locate an entry in an electronic address bookor contact list. The entry may comprise the response message to applyfor the particular caller.

FIG. 8 is a flow chart of an embodiment of a method to automaticallyrespond to incoming calls. At 802 an incoming call event occurs. At 804it is determined whether the active profile indicates an automaticresponse to incoming calls. If not, the method concludes at 806.Otherwise, a check is made at 808 as to whether the active profileindicates a particular response message for the particular time of dayand/or location. If so, the message for the particular time of dayand/or location is transmitted to the caller at 810. If not, a generalmessage is transmitted to the caller at 812. Again, in variousembodiments, the messaging technique is SMS, EMS, MMS, and/or voice. Anelectronic calendar may be employed to facilitate response with adate/time/location-specific message. For example, in one embodiment acalendar is consulted to determine whether or not the called party isparticipating in a scheduled event (in a meeting, shopping, at a socialfunction, etc.). The calendar entry for the event may comprise theappropriate response message (e.g. “I'm in a meeting that will be endingat five o'clock. Please call back then.”).

Using profiles to determine the manner in which a wireless telephone orother wireless device responds to incoming calls may reduce distractionsand interruptions from incoming calls in situations where interruptionis undesirable. Profiles are convenient and well-understood by largenumbers of wireless telephone users. The settings of profiles mayinclude settings for defining a response message that is provided by thewireless telephone or device, or by the network by which itcommunicates.

While certain features of the invention have been illustrated asdescribed herein, many modifications, substitutions, changes andequivalents will now occur to those skilled in the art. It is, therefor,to be understood that the appended claims are intended to cover all suchembodiments and changes as fall within the true spirit of the invention.

1. A method comprising: storing a setting in a profile of a wirelessdevice to indicate an automatic message response to incoming calls;setting the profile as an active profile; receiving an incoming call;automatically responding to the incoming call in accordance with thesetting. 2.-19. (canceled)